Cutting grains from the diet is one of the best things anyone can do for their health, not just people with IBD or Crohn’s. Congrats on dropping them and best wishes for continued good health.

The ideal workout volume and frequency varies between individuals. Most people seem to do well training the whole body twice weekly (once every three to four days) if the workouts are brief, but some may require more rest days between workouts to fully recover. If you’re not making reasonably good progress try adding more rest days between workouts.

Unless you have a joint problem which requires you to warm up to be able to exercise pain free warming up is unnecessary. If you do the exercise correctly there is no need or benefit to performing additional sets, drop sets, etc.

Check out The Sun Tan Analogy for the best explanation of why multiple sets and higher workout volume and frequency is not only unnecessary but counterproductive.

It is easier to add muscle size with a calorie surplus, but it is not necessary to eat so much as to add a significant amount of fat. It is a popular practice with bodybuilders to bulk up a bit during the off season before cutting for competition, with some gaining as much as 30 or 40 pounds or more (often with much of it from fat), but a more sensible approach would be to gradually increase calorie intake from fat and protein while paying close attention to appearance, body weight, and abdominal skin fold measurements.

Assuming proper training and diet if one has not reached the maximum muscular size they are capable of they should see relatively steady muscle strength and size gains over time with little increase in body fat. If strength and muscle size are not going up protein or overall food intake needs to be increased. If fat is going up more than just a little, then it needs to be decreased or the types of foods being eaten need to change.

This is something I get a lot of questions about and plan to address in more detail in a separate post.

Keep your leg work to a minimum and try to train legs on days you don’t plan on playing. If you are able to make good progress on squats or deadlifts doing either of them once weekly there is no need to do more except maybe a heel raise for calves.

CrossFit needs to be bashed. It is counterproductive for the purpose of improving long term health and fitness and has set a very bad example for a lot of people. The problems with the CrossFit philosophy and methodology need to be pointed out so people can make informed choices about it.

Without seeing exactly how you’re doing these I can not comment specifically, but depending on your body positioning you might be doing something to irritate your neck and joints. I will be addressing timed static contractions on the site soon and will be addressing these exercises.

When working with athletes and individuals with physically demanding jobs you have to balance the demands of exercise against the demands of skill training and other physical activities with respect to the constraints of their goals and their response to exercise.

I get questions about this often in phone consultations and will probably write something about it over the next few months.

Doing your own cooking helps considerably, but it is possible to eat out and be healthy if you are careful about where you eat and make sensible choices.

I agree with what Clarence said. The taste of the best food in the world can’t compete with the feeling of being at your physical peak.

Any frequency of training not too high to prevent recovery and adaptation or too low to allow decompensation will eventually get an individual to their maximum muscular potential. The ideal frequency which allows one to maximize their potential as quickly as possible varies considerably between individuals and requires some experimentation to determine. Two full body workouts per week is a good starting point and most will require a lower frequency or a reduction in workout volume as they improve and the intensity of their workouts increases.

You don’t need to train full ROM to become bigger and stronger and certain isometric protocols are much safer. I wrote about this in the chapters Motion and Range of Motion in Elements of Form and will be writing about some of the work we are doing with timed static contraction within the next few months.